


The Bright Mirror

by grey_sw (grey)



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: Gen, warning: canon miscarriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-06
Updated: 2010-10-06
Packaged: 2017-10-12 11:32:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/124402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grey/pseuds/grey_sw
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>When Caprica went to wash her hands, the mirror on the wall seemed very bright. She stood before it, turning from side to side, trying to see it -- the flaw in her, in all Cylons, the broken part that had killed her little son.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	The Bright Mirror

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sabaceanbabe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabaceanbabe/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Reflections](https://archiveofourown.org/works/59069) by [sabaceanbabe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabaceanbabe/pseuds/sabaceanbabe). 



Caprica waited for hours, until the last of the night-shift workers cleared the corridors. There were still a few people awake in Dogsville, coughing and shifting on their cold pallets, but the halls outside were quiet when she stepped past the Marines at the door. She walked quickly, even though she still hurt. She wasn't willing to look back to see if the Marines were staring.

She knew they would be.

She stood for a long time in front of the door marked _AFT HEAD_. Her stomach rolled -- a side effect of the drugs, Cottle had said, of the surgery -- and when she finally went inside, she wasn't regal, wasn't smooth the way a Six should have been. She barely managed to stumble to the toilet before she threw up.

It took a long time, coming in waves and waves. She'd think she'd gotten everything out, and then it'd start up again, until bright yellow bile spattered the porcealin. Finally, it stopped. She crouched there, trying hard not to rub her stomach.

It was empty. _She_ was empty. Liam was gone, and all he'd left behind was hollow and sore.

She groaned, lay there for a moment longer, and then got to her feet. She tore off a little square of toilet paper and wiped the vomit off the seat. When she flushed, the sound filled the empty room.

When she went to wash her hands, the mirror on the wall seemed very bright. She stood before it, turning from side to side, trying to see it -- the flaw in her, in all Cylons, the broken part that had killed her little son.

She gave in, after a while, and lifted her dress to look. She was still the same, though, the same Six. She stared at her belly, and her own skin felt strange to her: almost alien, deceptively soft and smooth. Liam had been there the day before, just the other day, and now he was gone. Dead. Forever. Yet there was no scar, no mark, no blemish to show where he'd so recently been. Her own body seemed like a betrayal.

 _Resurrection,_ she thought. _I wish we still had it, so I could kill myself and find a body that never knew Liam._ But it wasn't a very true thought; even before, when it didn't mean anything, she'd always hated dying. And she would know Liam anywhere, forever, new body or not.

Instead, she washed her hands and turned away. She wandered up the hall, past barracks and storerooms, looking at everything yet seeing nothing. Part of her wanted to project, but there was nothing left in her _to_ project. Perhaps her forest had died.

She walked on past rust and blackened steel instead. She walked and walked, pulling her shawl around her shoulders, gazing blankly at the ship around her. Then, at last, her feet came to a stop, as if on their own. She looked up at the hatch before her, blinking as though she'd just awakened.

It said _AGATHON, K. / AGATHON, S._

The hatch was open a little bit. That should have told the story, in and of itself, but she wasn't thinking clearly enough to hear it. She pushed it open, and walked inside.

They were sitting on the rack, together but not together, close yet pointedly not touching. Helo had such a strained, desperate look on his face that Caprica looked down, half-expecting to see he'd been shot. He hadn't been. His hands were clasped together in his lap, white-knuckle tight before his unblemished uniform.

Sharon sat beside him, staring off into space. She looked the way Caprica must have a moment before; like a true machine. One that someone had shut off. The only hint of life in her was the anger in her eyes, bright as any Caprica had ever seen.

"Sharon?" Caprica asked. It was the first thing she'd said all day, and her voice cracked a little as the word went out of her.

Sharon looked up at her, slowly. Her eyes narrowed. "Caprica?" she asked.

Caprica nodded. Helo was looking at her, too, but she kept her eyes on Sharon's, frozen by what she saw there.

Loss. Loss like hers.

"Hera," Sharon finally whispered. "Hera's gone, she's _gone_ , that bitch frakking _took_ her--"

Beside her, Helo jerked to his feet. He turned to Sharon, as if to plead with her, but she flinched away. The next thing Caprica knew, Helo was pushing past her, his face full of utter devastation. Caprica half-turned to follow, but Sharon called to her.

"Let him go," she spat. "Let him. I don't-- I don't want to see him right now."

"What happened?" Caprica asked. But she was already starting to remember. She'd heard some something talking about it in Dogsville: about the way Boomer had fooled Helo, had masqueraded as his wife. About the way she'd tricked him, and stolen his child. It had barely registered with Caprica at the time; she'd had her own pain, her own suffering to deal with.

Once, she would have laughed if someone had suggested that she might someday value her own child over the Cylons' miracle baby. Once.

Now, she looked into Sharon's eyes and saw her own pain and desolation reflected there. This was her sister, who had died and come back again for her baby; her sister, who'd lost her child just as Caprica had.

With a sigh, Caprica sank onto the floor at Sharon's feet. Her fingers toyed with the fringe on her shawl. For a long time, neither of them spoke.

"I lost her," Sharon finally said. "She's gone."

Caprica nodded. She didn't trust her voice, not yet.

"She took her. _She_. Boomer, that bitch." She said it as just one word, _Boomer-that-bitch_ , and Caprica winced. Boomer had been her friend, once, her first and only friend, so Caprica had been a little bit cold toward Sharon at first. Sharon -- _Athena_ \-- had stolen Boomer's life, after all. She'd taken the Fleet, and Helo, and the baby, all things that might have been Boomer's by right. Caprica could still remember how Boomer had cried at night, when she thought Caprica couldn't hear. Now she'd taken her own back, and though Caprica felt awful for Athena, some small part of her understood.

If only she could do it, too. If only _she_ could tear the smug, hateful eyeballs right out of Ellen Tigh's head... but no. She could blame neither Ellen nor Athena, not really.

They hadn't _meant_ to steal. They hadn't.

Caprica let out a long, slow breath, and leaned back against the bunk. "I'm sorry," she said. "I am. I wish it hadn't happened." When Sharon said nothing, she whispered, "I lost Liam, too."

That got Sharon's attention. She raised her head, slowly, and looked down at Caprica. "Your baby..."

Caprica looked away. Her hands knotted together in her lap, of their own accord. She hadn't even been able to hold him. There hadn't been enough left, enough like a baby, so Doc Cottle had taken her Liam away before she woke.

"Not anymore," she said.

Sharon made a quiet sound and then reached down for her, resting her hand on Caprica's bare shoulder. The contact was shocking -- no one had touched her since she'd lost the baby. Not the nurses, not the refugees in Dogsville, and especially not Saul.

She'd begun to believe that no one _would_ touch her.

She shut her eyes and bowed her head, letting her sister's hand whisper over her shoulder, between her curls. The gentle, sisterly touch reminded her of being new, of Resurrection. She reached up and took Sharon's other hand, squeezing it in her own. They sat like that for a long time, saying nothing, until Sharon finally spoke.

"Karl wants to go after her," she muttered. "He thinks the Admiral will give him a Raptor. I keep telling him-- I keep telling him he's crazy, she's frakking _gone_ , but--"

Caprica nodded. If Cavil had her, then Hera really was gone. He'd never let her go. Athena and the others had destroyed the Hub, had stolen their brothers' future; Cavil, like Boomer, would take it back at any cost. But then, apropos of nothing, Caprica thought of Gaius Baltar. She'd kept him out of her mind for months, ever since Saul, but now he was back again: his smile, his laugh, his ridiculous pinstripe suit. There was something about him... something important.

Caprica took a deep breath. "I'll go," she said, all in a rush. "If you go to get her back, I'll go, too." She wasn't sure why she'd said it, but now that she had, she was sure it was the truth.

Sharon didn't thank her. She just squeezed Caprica's hand, and said nothing at all.

They sat together for a long time, and then Caprica stood, and fixed her shawl, and closed the hatch behind her.

Karl hadn't come back, the way Saul hadn't come back.


End file.
